"On the 14th Itsi appeared with his war-canoe at 9 A.M., bringing three goats and twenty loaves of cassava bread and a few tubers, and an hour afterwards Nchuvira, King of Nkunda, Mankoneh, chief of the Bateké fishermen near the Stanley Pool, and the King of Nshasa, at the southeast end of the Stanley Pool, arrived at our camp with several canoe crews. Each of the petty sovereigns of the districts in our neighborhood contributed a little, but altogether we were only able to distribute to each person two pounds of eatable provisions. Every chief was eager for a present, with which he was gratified, and solemn covenants of peace were entered into between the whites and the blacks. The treaty with Itsi was exceedingly ceremonious, and involved the exchange of charms. Itsi transferred to me, for my protection through life, a small gourdful of a curious powder, which had rather a saline taste, and I delivered over to him, as the white man's charm against all evil, a half-ounce vial of magnesia; further, a small scratch in Frank's arm, and another in Itsi's arm, supplied blood sufficient to unite us in one and indivisible bond of fraternity. After this we were left alone.
"An observation by boiling-point, above the first cataract of Livingstone Falls, disclosed to us an altitude of 1147 feet above the ocean. At Nyangwé the river was 2077 feet. In twelve hundred and thirty-five miles, therefore, there had been only a reduction of 930 feet, divided as follows:
Nyangé 2077 } Four miles below seventh cataract, } Stanley Falls 1511 } ---- } 337 20 inches. Feet, 566 }
Four miles below seventh cataract, Stanley Falls 1511 } River at Ntamo, above first cataract, } Livingstone Falls 1147 } 898 5 inches, ---- } River nearly. Feet, 364 } uninterrupted."
Frank paused a few moments, and, at the request of one of his auditors, repeated the figures he had just given. Then he continued the narrative as follows:
"The wide wild land which, by means of the greatest river of Africa, we have pierced, is now about to be presented in a milder aspect than that which has filled the preceding pages with records of desperate conflicts and furious onslaughts of savage men. The people no longer resist our advance. Trade has tamed their natural ferocity, until they no longer resent our approach with the fury of beasts of prey.